cindy's world

In the afternoon yesterday, I received two emails that informed me of a spontaneous 1pm meeting today (which is during lunch) and on the 25th. Annoyed at the late notice, I decided I wasn’t going to forego my lunchtime workout today for the meeting, so I’m going to hit a 3-mile run before the meeting. But I emailed my gym trainee to let her know I would not be able to go to the gym with her. Today, she returned with a similar forwarded email meeting notice. Her meeting’s tomorrow, with equally late notice. I complained that supervision is trying to keep us from gymming since my meeting’s today, hers is tomorrow, and there’s a special event luncheon on Friday.

Gym Trainee: I thought your meeting was on the 25 of this month.
Me: it’s today AND the 25th.
Trainee: oh that’s crazy. Do you guys have that much to talk about.
Me: I’m just gonna be there as an accessory. People won’t even notice me.
Trainee: that may be a good thing. I won’t be able to do that. Which is why I was told to go.
Me: I’m sure if you ran 3 miles right before the meeting, you could zone out too.
Trainee: Please I have a chair on the beach at club med already reserved for the meeting.
Me: lemme borrow it for today’s meeting and I’ll have it set up for you again for your meeting tomorrow.
Trainee: Ok. It’s the lounge chair with the three long island teas next to it on a tray and a magic wand sitting on in the drink holder in case I need it 🙂
Me: I’ll have to borrow your magic wand at the beach cuz I’m taking mine with me to the meeting.
Trainee: that’s what it’s for while I’m at the meeting. Every time they try to bring me back from club med I’ll just hit them over the head with it.

We’re so into our jobs.

I popped some vitamins on an empty stomach before leaving the house this morning, and I usually have adverse reactions to vitamins taken without food, so I opened a new box of protein bars and unsealed a bar on my drive in to work. It was an “all natural” brand made of “all natural” ingredients like oats and dried fruit, no candy coating. Pushing a bit of the brown cow-poo looking stuff out the top of the package, I took a bite. My mouth was instantly filled with the foul sensation of having put asphalt and black tar on my tongue. I couldn’t bite into the piece, but as I was driving, I couldn’t spit it out, either. I looked at the label. What the hell flavor was this, “Satan’s Ass, Now with Real Dingleberries!”?! It was chocolate raspberry. I sniffed the bar. It seemed fine. I bit into the piece in my mouth carefully. Maybe this bar just tastes like this? As I chewed, I realized that as much as I don’t like the raspberry seeds, it wasn’t THAT bad. I took another bite. It seemed okay. A third bite, and again the nasty tar and black oil smell/taste filled my mouth. At a red light, I looked at the one side of the bar I hadn’t yet examined, the surface in the wrapper that faced away from me. It was covered with white furriness.

Great. Mold. I’m eating mold.

I chugged half a bottle of water that I’d thankfully refilled this morning and put in my workout bag, in the passenger seat. After coming to work, I asked my new bailiff, who’s a mom (and therefore should have above-common-sense knowledge magically infused into her brain), “What would happen to someone for eating moldy bread and stuff like that?”
She said, “Not much. They make penicillin out of bread mold, so it’s not going to hurt you.”
I said, “Oh, so all it’s gonna do is kill the bad bacteria in my body.” I can live with that.

So it’s been 2 hours now and I haven’t had any problems. We’ll see how the rest of the day goes.

My coworker’s mother’s funeral this morning was a very nice Catholic mass service, complete with the counting of the rosary as an opening. Having virtually no Catholic exposure, I was surprised that the rosary went on that long, cuz I’d always thought when priests told sinners to say 3 “Hail Marys” to forgive sins (like in jokes), it was simply “Hail Mary, hail Mary, hail Mary. Yay, I’m forgiven.” Sitting through the very ritualistic practices of mass, I was aware that orthodox Catholics would find it a huge trespass for me to have sinful thoughts or participate in disrespectful behavior, especially while I sat there as a guest in the House of God. And of course, my brain (because it is, after all, MY brain) displayed a most unorthodox image in my head during all the sitting and standing then sitting then standing prayers and responses. When the priest said after a prayer, “You may sit,” and the congregation backed their bodies down onto the wooden bench, I pictured myself sitting on a large phallic protrusion coming out the center of my seat so that it strategically would create a huge sin. As soon as the absurd image entered my mind’s eye, I shoved it out in horror. “What is WRONG with you?!” I chastised my rebellious brain.

After the service was over, I stood with some coworkers and my judge. My judge revealed that as a boy, he’d attended a private Catholic school and the service today took him back to memories of that childhood, when he was always terrified of accidentally having an impure thought while in the church and going straight to hell. So it’s not just me. There’s something about what you’re not allowed to do, that makes human nature just do it. Or at least think about it. Well, if I can’t control my thoughts, at least I can control my actions. I would’ve knocked that phallus away from me, dirty unwanted thing! Yeah.

What an odd week. It began with my judge gone (vacation at a dude ranch, seriously) and causing me to float, covering 2-3 courtrooms a day, with a holiday smack in the middle of the week, a par-tay on the rooftop with boyfriend, friends and coworkers to watch fireworks, my judge finally returning today, and ends with a funeral tomorrow. Some other oddities:
– met up with my childhood friend Lily and her husband Arnold for dinner on Monday at Market City Caffe in Brea, one of my favorite Italian joints, and had Crepes Suzette (butter, powdered sugar, orange zest, orange syrup, Grand Marnier, a la mode) at a new crepes joint on the same street for dessert. Spent the $30 giftcard I’ve had for 2-3 years at the annual sale of Bed, Bath & Beyond.
– at the gym on Monday, I was entering my stats on the elliptical trainer as I began my workout, and when it asked for my age, I had to put in 31 for the first time. How official it felt.
– I only worked out Monday and Tuesday since Wednesday was the holiday, didn’t do it Thursday cuz after driving to the gym, parking, and going around the car to get my workout bag, I realized I’d left my shoes and socks at home. The one thing you can’t just buy a quickie replacement for at the gym. Today, Mr. W talked me out of gymming at lunch cuz he didn’t feel like it, so we met up for Lee’s Sandwiches instead. But we did just return from a 3.25 mile run just now. He’s at the pool to cool off and I’m sitting here blogging in sweaty running clothes.
– I have a headache from my ears being so cold from the run, and uterine cramps from PMS.
– I actually sorted and did laundry this week. I didn’t complete The Laundry Project as after presorting, turned out I had 9 piles/loads of clothes to wash, but I did get approximately halfway done. The categories left to wash and dry and put away are handwash delicates, reds, regular lights, rough-and-tumble lights, and regular darks. I’d already done sheets, delicate lights, delicate darks, and rough-and-tumble darks. (What OCD? I really have that many clothes that need washing. Nearly a full load each category! That’s how much I hate and procrastinate on laundry.)
– James came by yesterday as I was working on The Laundry Project and brought my birthday present. He’d complained that I was taking too long retrieving it, as it was taking up too much space on his desk at work. Why was it at work instead of home, you ask? Because he has no room in his house for this, he said. He did indeed hand me a gargantuan wrapped box that should really be housing a 32″ TV from the 80s (i.e., NOT flat screen), and I told him it better not contain a life-size fully animated interactive electronic bust of a mountain gorilla. Mr. W and I had bought that from The Sharper Image for Mr. W’s brother for Christmas, and it was so lifelike it scared the bejezus out of people walking by the kitchen, where it was sitting all disembodied on the counter. It even broke my heart when everyone was playing Guitar Hero in the living room and it was lonely by itself in the kitchen, and would let out these sad elongated coos. But James reassured me that it did not contain any gorilla parts. Instead, I tore into the box to find…a big heavy coil of garden hose! Woohoo! And a new Zaino spray polish product, plus a new Zaino polishing pad. I had to laugh. Both the Accord and IS350 sitting in my garage are filthy, and my singular excuse for not doing something about it had been, “I don’t have a hose, I’ll have to wait till I go to my parents’/Mr. W’s/James’ house to wash cars together.” So much for that. The box is now a nice cat toy for Dodo in the living room.
– James and I had mall food for dinner last nite after he brought over my hose, since I was craving a particular little French cafe in the Brea Mall. I think it’s called the Le Diplomat Cafe. Afterwards, I finally spent the $50 gift certificate to Pottery Barn that college roommie Diana gave me for my bday in 2003. Met the most computer-unsavvy chick I’d seen since the 80s, and she was our age, so no excuse! We had to explain AOL vs. SBC Global DSL Internet Service to her. She was paying for both at $49/mo each. And she didn’t know what we meant by “uninstall AOL.” So she begged James to help her and he nicely gave her a business card, telling her to call if she “really, really can’t find anyone else.” She was cute, too. Too bad she’s married. (For James, I mean.)

So aside from the yet-to-come funeral of my coworker’s mother tomorrow morning, that concludes my irregular week in a (rather oversized) nutshell.

This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words:

heroin (4x) sex (3x) knife (2x) lesbian (1x)

I’m shocked. Truly. I only talked about heroi — uh, that narcotic — in the legal sense of the term, and lesbi — women who sexually and romantically prefer to date their own gender? I don’t recall using that word at all! But I AM surprised that it’d only come up once. And KNIF — uh, metallic tool used to spread BUTTER? Are they KIDDING? Thanks, Flat Coke, for the link!

I was at the trendy surfer clothing shop Tilly’s a little earlier today. Mr. W was trying on some hideous plaid shorts in the dressing room, and I was wandering the bikini section alone. I wore no makeup, hair down, fitted red camisole tanktop, low-riding Roxy board shorts, and flip flops. And a teenage girl salesclerk walked up to me and said, “Scuse me, ma’am? Are you finding everything okay?” Ma’am?! Do I look THAT much older than her? It wasn’t even 6 months ago that I was mistaken by some judges at a high school singing competition for one of the competitors. Ptth.

Yesterday morning, Mr. W and I brought our free passes we got in the mail over to Universal Studios Themepark, Hollywood, arriving over half an hour before the park opens. That’s life with the W — always cracking the whip in the morning panicking about being “late,” always waiting at the destination having arrived overzealously early. I have to say, though, that I enjoyed Universal Studios so much more than I’d enjoyed Disneyland. I think it has better rides, better special effects on the rides (well duh, it’s Universal Studios with Hollywood magic), and less people! Best of all, less kids! They also let you bring in your own water and provide cooling spray misters and roof overhangs/awnings so we’re more comfortable in line. Disneyland has virtually no shade and no trees near lines and no misters in order to force its customers to buy water, ice cream and sodas at its strategically placed concession carts. Because of the uncrowdedness in the earlier half of the day, we were able to get on every ride we wanted by noon with lines of 5 minutes or less. “Jurassic Park, The Ride” was a first for me. And might I say — KICK ASS! They say it’s “now wetter than ever,” and they were right! They accomplished that by having dinosaurs pop out of the water at random points of the river coaster and spray us directly with their mouths! We also duck under trickling waterfalls, and there’s a big, GIANT splash at the end that got me completely by surprise. Water hit me directly in my face and on my body for long enough that my brain went through this, “Okay, now I’m getting wet. Gotta close my eyes. I’m still getting wet. What the heck, it’s just coming down!” and I yelled, “Oh my GAWD!” while covering my face with my hands at this point. And then the water stopped. I realized as I climbed out of the ride that the way the ride loads, it’s specifically designed so that the people getting into the raft as well as the people waiting in line for the ride can not see the drenched riders getting off. Such is movie magic, and the element of surprise maintained by controlling the audience’s perception. (Seriously, click on the link. You’ll see the short 15-second video.)

Some other noteables — our first ride of the day was “Back to the Future, The Ride,” and it’s a simulated flight ride in a large projection screen room much like Disneyland’s “Star Tours” and California Adventure’s “Soaring Over California.” We’re in a convertible DeLorean and it seats four across the front, four across the back. We got put in a group with a robust dad, corporeal mom, their two substantial kids, and another adult couple who are the family’s corpulent friends. The 4-member family took up the front row with the 2 kids in the center seats, and the back row from left to right was me, Mr. W, male friend, female friend. The joint lap bar that had to be lowered over everyone together across our row stopped at my chest level, leaving a good foot-and-a-half gap between it and my lap. I’m not blaming the strangers for being physically configured so as to stop the progress of the bar early. I’m just saying that I feared for my life as the topless, side-less DeLorean pushed forward toward the screen and the floor dropped away beneath us, and the ride began its shaking, rocking, jolting simulated journey. I also couldn’t see what was coming because I was behind the father and despite the size of the screen, his back and head blocked most of my view.

Oh, I was also an official actress at a real studio with real cameramen and special effects crew yesterday! While standing in line waiting for the next “Special Effects Stages” show to begin, Mr. W suddenly started raising his arm and jumping. I looked to the front and there were 2 workers in blue vests looking around. Apparently they’d asked for something. Were they asking for a party of 2 to fill in some seating somewhere? We were selected and Mr. W, pulling me to the front of the line, said, “Is that okay?” “Is WHAT okay?” I asked him as the worker said, “Thanks for volunteering!” We were shuttled inside the building as everyone else remained outside in line, and Mr. W was handed a waiver form. The worker quickly explained that we’re going to be on 10-foot high platforms and Mr. W would be chained to a wall groaning in pain and I would be screaming and moving “heavy” foam blocks from one side of me to the other. Eh? Well, I don’t get to do THAT at work!
Turned out we were being used to demo the special blue-screen effects used in Universal Pictures movies and TV shows. After the audience was situated, Mr. W and I were instructed to leave the actors’ fold-up chairs we were in, and I went onstage as the audience was viewing an old 50’s movie clip that showed a woman looking out her living room window and seeing a huge cat face taking up the window, and she was doing the 50s hysterical screaming with hands to her face. I was handed a curtain string, and the demonstration guy doing the show asked me before the audience, “Are you scared of cats, Cindy?” If you know me, that’s the last thing I’d be scared of, so I hesitated, and decided upon the answer, “Um, I can be.” The audience laughed and the guy said, “Good answer, actress! Okay, when I say ‘action,’ pull the string, opening the curtain. Look out the window, and you’ll see a huge cat head. If you look at the monitor, you’ll look about 6 inches tall, and this cat will be pawing at you and batting. Scream, and keep screaming like a scream could save your life. Let’s do a scream now for practice.” He leaned back, covered his ears, and I did my blood-curdling horror movie death scream while covering my face like the black and white actress, stopped abruptly, and grinned at the audience, changing my expression completely. The audience laughed and cheered. The presenter complimented my scream, I was told to remain standing on the “X” on the floor, and ‘action’ was called. I screamed, ducked, screamed some more, raised an arm to block my head from the giant fuzzy paw on a stick that Mr. W was holding to bat at me off-stage, screamed, tried to push the paw away, screamed. The audience was really impressed and cheered and applauded, but I had no idea what the finished product looked like, since I was too busy screaming at the giant cat.
Next, I was placed in a chair onstage as the presenter explained that they were about to see a clip from the upcoming sequel of “The Nutty Professor” starring Eddie Murphy. All actors in the clip are in place except for one, which I will be bluescreened into. Turned out it was the dinner table scene. They rolled the clip, and I was instructed to wave to the camera. So all of a sudden, in the monitor, there I was seated at the dinner table with a family stuffing their face and waving at the audience. I was handed a plastic turkey leg and told to gnaw at it like a Neanderthal, go! I held it in both hands and gnawed like it was corn, and I appeared in the shot in mid-action and the audience busted up. Then I was told to wag an index finger back and forth in front of me and lip sync the words, “You betta mind yo’ own business, grandma!” with attitude. So I appeared and I mouthed the line with a snobby expression on my face while doing the “sista-head-action.” The audience roared.
The last thing was the 10-foot platform scene we were prewarned about. We were put in ancient Egyptian garb and walked up stairs backstage. Mr. W was chained ankles and wrists to a stone wall in front of the audience, and I was walked a few steps down past him in between two stacks of foam bricks. He was instructed to moan and groan in tortured pain, and the presenter at the lower stage said, “Go ahead and give us a cry of pain, [Mr. W].” Mr. W let out two or three noises, and the presenter retorted, “I said CRY OF PAIN, not MOAN OF ECSTASY, [Mr. W]!” as the audience laughed. I was an Egyptian slave who was taking the large “heavy” foam blocks from my left and placing them on my right, and “action” was called. I struggled and yanked the first block, barely slid it off the stack as I fell to one knee with the weight, then moved it to my right, placing it above the other stack. Turning back to my left for another block, I saw the second director yelling at Mr. W to moan louder, look more tortured, as Mr. W moaned like I’d never heard him moan before. =P On the monitor, we were bluescreened into the movie “The Mummy.” I struggled and managed to yank another block over to my right, topping over the rest of the blocks, and then lightning struck Mr. W and the studio went dark. In the darkness, a presenter said, “What happened? Okay, just a minute folks, nothing to be worried about, we’ll have our lights working shortly.” The lights came on, and the presenter at the lower stage looked up at us and yelled, “OH my GOD!” Everyone looked over to where Mr. W was, where there is now only a skeleton strapped to the wall. Everyone laughed. The second presenter ran up to the bones. “Is he alive?” the first presenter called from the bottom. “[Mr. W]! Can you hear me?” the second presenter yelled at the skeleton while giving it a backhand pimp slap. The audience laughed. The second presenter walked sadly to the front of the elevated stage, looking down. “No, I’m afraid he isn’t,” he announced. I put my hands together in a delighted clap, jumping up and down lightly. The audience laughed again. “Is CINDY alive?” the first presenter, who was out of view of me, asked. The presenter on the stage with me said, “I’ll check” and turned to me with his arm up like he was about to give ME a back-hand, too. The audience gasped and I dropped my jaw in mock horror, and the 1st presenter yelled out right in time, “NOOO!” The 2nd guy froze. I was then walked down to join the audience in a special VIP seating area to enjoy the rest of the show. Alone. Since Mr. W was struck by lightning onstage and died.
In the next show segment, the presenters of the special effects told us about the fake blood that Hollywood had used through time, how it used to be chocolate syrup in the black and white days, and then red-colored water in the Jaws days. One presenter raised a large jar with some crusty red stuff in it. “I’m out of fake blood,” he announced, “So I’ll have to use REAL blood for this demo. Where can I get real blood?” All of a sudden the wall behind him rotated and Mr. W came spinning into the room screaming bloody murder, bound to the wall. “Oh my GOD! He’s been brought back to LIFE!” the presenters said in joy. They grabbed his arm, put it in a sink, and the monitor over them showed a knife sinking into his arm with blood gushing out. Mr. W screamed. The kids in the audience whimpered. I laughed. And then they showed how it was done as they raised the knife with the semi-circle cut into the edge. Then they cleaned the “blood” off his arm, returned him into the audience, thanking the heavens that he was brought back to life “altho Cindy didn’t even seem to care. She was like, ‘Eh. Whatever.’ ” Well, he SIGNED a WAIVER.